Sears Spinning Off Some Stores into Separate Company

Sears Holdings Corp. has filed paperwork to spin off its smaller Hometown and Outlet stores as well as some hardware stores into a separate publicly traded company.

Sears, which runs also runs Kmart, had announced the separation plans in February. The company, which is trying to turn around its business and spruce up its image, said in a regulatory filing on Monday that it had a total of 1,238 Hometown, Outlet and hardware stores as of April 28. It has since closed five Hometown stores, eight hardware stores and one Outlet store, with plans to close another hardware store.

ESL Investments Inc., which includes billionaire investor Edward Lampert, will own a majority stake in the business.

The new company will be listed on the Nasdaq under the "SHOS" ticker symbol.